Cabbie fined over street pick-up

A CAB driver who illegally picked up passengers on the street has been ordered to pay more than £700 by magistrates. Rafiq Jamadar 35, could now lose his badge after he was spotted by a police officer and a Manchester council official collecting two fares at Deansgate Locks in the early hours of the morning.

A CAB driver who illegally picked up passengers on the street has been ordered to pay more than £700 by magistrates.

Rafiq Jamadar 35, could now lose his badge after he was spotted by a police officer and a Manchester council official collecting two fares at Deansgate Locks in the early hours of the morning.

Magistrates were told that only black-cab drivers can legally be flagged down and that all private-hire bookings have to pre-arranged through a firm's base, otherwise a driver is not insured.

The driver was found guilty of illegally plying for hire and having no insurance after a trial at Manchester magistrates court and will now have to appear before a special licensing panel to plead his case for keeping his badge.

Magistrates told Mr Jamadar they found the case against him proved and found his evidence inconsistent and at times implausible.

The court heard that the two women passengers in his car had asked him to take them to Handforth asking if £20 would cover the journey fare.

When challenged about what he had done, Mr Jamadar claimed there had been no arrangement to accept money from the pair, and there had been an unfortunate misunderstanding.

He said his wife had called him on his mobile phone, asking if he could pick up two of her friends who were stranded in Manchester city centre, and unable to get home because they had no cash.

He said he had never met the friends, so could not recognise them, and when he was flagged down by two women outside Revolution Bar, he assumed they were the women he had been asked to collect.

One of the women he picked up however, told the court that there had been no confusion, and they had clearly asked him if he could take them as paying passengers. Accounts manager Clare Lovelady said she offered him £20 and he seemed more than happy with the arrangement.

She said they got into his silver VW Golf car, but two minutes later the driver told them he was having to stop as he was being flashed by a following police car.

She said: "The driver turned round to us both and said `Will you tell the police that you know my wife Louise, and that you had pre-booked the car in advance otherwise I'll be in trouble.' "

Laura Raine prosecuting, told the court: "Illegally plying for hire is a serious offence. By law, private hire cars can only be pre-booked through a company's base, a measure designed in the main, to protect passengers.

"If bookings are made in this way, operators know precisely where cars are at any given time, but clearly if drivers are picking up fares on the street, the same level of protection cannot be afforded. Not only that, the driver has no insurance."

She suggested in court that he had known exactly what he was doing, and had simply been out to make a fast buck by taking cash from a passenger without a proper booking being made. He said he would never do such a thing.

The court was told that Mr Jamadar had been spotted by a council compliance officer, and traffic police officer who were making routine checks on both private hire and hackney cabs to check they were properly licensed.

Ms Raine said that when challenged, Mr Jamadar had not been wearing his private hire badge, and when he was able to produce one, it had expired.

Council officer George Farrelly said the driver, who worked for King's private hire, had had to be warned on previous occasions about not wearing his badge and that when cautioned on suspicion of illegally plying for hire, had said to him: "So have I lost my licence now?"

Mr Jamadar, of Brunell Walk in Blackburn, was fined £175 for illegally plying, and £150 and eight penalty points on his licence for having no insurance.

He was fined £35 on each of two offences of not wearing his private hire badge, and ordered to pay £300 towards costs, and a £15 victim surcharge.